The Supreme Court’s ruling about what is euphemistically called “assisted dying,” but in actuality “assisted suicide,” is one that could have far-reaching negative consequences.
Medical practitioners are being asked to assist in taking a life. What about those who conscientiously object? Will they still have to be part of a referral process? If so, they would still be part of the assistance?
What about the pharmacists who conscientiously object to preparing the “death cocktail.”
Many of the finest hospitals in our country are Catholic. A great example in our area is St. Joseph’s in Comox. I have experienced their great care.
In Catholic hospitals, all life from the moment of conception to the moment of natural death is sacred. Will they be required to provide assisted suicide?
Rather than comply, will they close their doors, and our country could lose some of its finest hospitals, medical care, and medical practitioners?
The tendency for social policy is to become more liberal with the passage of time, I have no doubt this would be the case for assisted suicide.
Playing God doesn’t have absolutes; it’s highly subjective. What starts out with the terminally ill, or aged near death, will likely expand to persons with severe mental problems, then the severely physically disabled? What about younger people with a debilitating disease?
When I was 21, I contracted Crohn’s disease. I suffered day after day, month after month. I lost almost 40 per cent of my body weight; 13 months in hospital over a three year period; many failed medications, and many, many operations.
With all the pain, quite frankly, I thought at the time I would rather be dead. Fortunately, through a lot of prayer, and the care, skill and dedication of many medical practitioners, I was eventually healed. That was more than 40 years ago.
We live in an age of moral relativism. The state is intruding into more areas of basic human existence. All laws come from a moral basis.
Just because the Supreme Court says it’s a “right,” doesn’t make it right. Surely one of the basic tenets of life should be its preservation all the way to natural death, whether our own or someone else’s.
Gordon H. RenfreeParksville
